A recent study has revealed that Ghana’s legal framework lacks deliberate, up-to-date provisions to effectively address the growing threat of misinformation and disinformation, particularly in the digital age.
The study was presented at a multi-stakeholder conference held in Accra under the theme, “Navigating the Balance: Laws, Disinformation and Free Speech.”
The research, spearheaded by Penplusbytes, examined the capacity of existing Ghanaian laws to tackle the complexities of mis/disinformation in the digital era.
“The purpose was to try and understand the current state of law in Ghana and how well positioned they are for addressing the challenge of misinformation and disinformation,” said Professor Abena Yeboah-Banin of the School of Communication Studies and team lead.
“And so what we did was to take a review of provisions in the Criminal Offences Act, the Constitution of the Republic, the Electronic Communications Act, the Cyber Security Law, and then the Right to Information Law, because we believe these are laws that have provisions that speak to things relating to the information ecosystem and therefore provisions that everyone should know about are appropriated when addressing issues of misinformation and disinformation in other countries,” she added.
The study found that although these laws touch on issues within the information ecosystem, they were created for different purposes and do not reflect the current realities of mis/disinformation.
“One of the issues we found was that, on the one hand, these laws generally exist for other purposes and they tend to be being appropriated to address a new challenge that has emerged, misinformation and disinformation.
To that extent, they are not exactly, they don’t have currency, they don’t have the details that the dynamics of misinformation and disinformation as occurs in the world of 2025 may require,” Professor Yeboah-Banin stated.
She pointed to the Criminal Offences Act as an example: “When we take the Criminal Offenses Act, which is coming from the 1960s, by which time the internet wasn’t an issue, social media wasn’t an issue, disinformation and disinformation as we know it today were not issues then. But we’re dealing with an issue that is happening now and has so many nuances, including even the role of AI in generating and spreading misinformation and disinformation.” She also noted issues of vagueness and potential misuse of the law: “Some of the provisions in the law may need some scoping and confining to make them better applicable objectively. So for instance, the thing about causing fear and panic, the confluence of that thing, it’s a bit fluid and tends sometimes to be used to target people who are deemed to have voices different from perhaps those in positions of influence,” she said.
Moreover, she highlighted a conflict between the Constitution’s protections and how some laws are enforced: “There’s also what seems to be disagreement or discord between the aspirations of our constitution and some of the intent behind some of the provisions in the law. So the 1992 constitution is quite upfront about its desire for Ghanaians to have the right to free expression, the right to free speech, the right to think freely, the right to form opinions etc. but some of these laws are easily usable to claw back on some of those rights that the constitution is interested in protecting.”
The research also found that most existing legal provisions focus solely on individuals who create or spread misinformation, while overlooking the role of digital platforms.
“The focus of the laws tend towards the perpetrator, the one posting something online, etc. But if you look at global best practices, laws and regulations also take an interest in the platforms, towards forcing the platform owners to do better, to sanitize their spaces, to reduce the spread of misinformation, how helpful their platforms are to the spread of misinformation and disinformation. And our laws don’t seem to have anything that is targeting, for instance, engagements with Facebook or Twitter, etc. to force them to sanitize the spaces for Ghanaians.”
The researchers made several key recommendations. “One of the first recommendations we make is perhaps that it is time to look at developing some guidelines that clarify the scope of some of the provisions in the law to make them less susceptible to arbitrary application,” Professor Yeboah-Banin said.
“We also recommend the need perhaps for Ghana to push an agenda for regional level interventions in law that enable dealings and conversations with the platforms, the digital platforms,” she continued. “We also suggest that perhaps we should look at the possibility of an ombudsman entity, an independent mediator, so that when issues of misinformation and disinformation come up, so that the laws are not weaponized to wrongfully target different voices or dissenting voices.”
She stressed the importance of a civil, rather than criminal, approach. “Because in 2001 as a country we decided we don’t want to criminalize free expression and we cancelled the criminal libel and seditious law so we think that we need to remind them about that.”
Speaking at the same event, Mr. Jerry Sam, Executive Director of Penplusbytes, emphasized the importance of media literacy in tackling mis/disinformation at the root.
“Over the years, we’ve done a lot of work around information integrity. Of course, there’s a lot of work being done around fact-checking, which is obviously very important, because we need counter-information, we need credible information, and fact-checking does that,” he said.
But he cautioned that fact-checking alone is not enough. “Disinformation sort of fits into people’s perceptions and their beliefs, what they want to believe in… When you come in with a fact-check, it’s quite difficult for you to change that perception and that belief. And so, it actually weakens our fact-checking efforts.”
He advocated for digital and media literacy as part of school curricula: “So media information is very, very important in the sense that it helps people to assess the right source for information… If possible, can we have it even in the curriculum as a standalone subject? If not even as a standalone subject, can we merge it with social studies, even civic education, have debates around media and information literacy, spot the fake, and all of that, so that they are inoculated against consuming disinformation and also spreading disinformation.”
Mr. Sam also proposed a national framework for handling disinformation: “The way forward for us is that we need to build a consensus on, as a country, how do we want to tackle the menace of disinformation. One of the key proposals that we have come up with is to develop a national guideline on executing existing laws on disinformation.”
“This guideline basically will bring about a protocol in defining what is disinformation, how do we report disinformation, and what mitigation strategies we will have… Ultimately, as we have found, most of our laws around information integrity almost seem to punish and also to sanction, make it criminal. Yes, sanctions can be there, but it should be civil, and at the end of the day, it should be in a way that protects and safeguards every individual in Ghana’s freedom of expression.”
Lydia Lamisi Akanvariba, Minister of State in Charge of Public Sector Reforms, raised concerns about the disproportionate effects of disinformation on women.
“Misinformation and disinformation affect us all, but most especially the female as a gender. The issue is that because of the cultural or socio-cultural stereotyping of gender issues in this country, it affects the female the most,” she said.
She acknowledged the presence of legal gaps: “Though the laws are there, but what is the gap between the law and what is happening practically? We are looking at areas where we can fill those gaps.”
She pledged government action: “We are going to make good use of the recommendation that the project has come up with… I will be calling upon my political minister so that we have a meeting so that we discuss what are the gaps that we need to fill so that this issue doesn’t affect us as a country.”
She concluded with a warning: “A little misinformation put up there can derail our thriving democracy in this country.”
By: Joshua Narh
